Poetry is above all, an approach to the truth of feeling.....a true poem will seize your imagination intellectually-that is, when you reach it, you will reach it intellectually too but the way is through emotion what we call feeling.- Murial Rukeyser
Apocalypse
Flames go up high reaching the stars ahead
Light together with radio waves, dead
Light life organism alive and well
Dark hands grope across to hell
Huge globes of fire swallowing all sight
Cleansing burning purifying shoots all to fright
Futile running people scrambling about
as I stand above laughing
In oblivion wings stretch karma proving
As I disappear I think how many sin
I see bright lights burning my within
Hands push and pull causing me wonder
I feel salvation as I see all who blunder
-Ibrahim Ridley
Ode To The Griffin
Fangs of Dragons
Claws of lions
Eyes of Eagle
Flying through the air with wings of the hugest span
Eyes that slice the soul
Spilling fear into it fellow man
A beast that can take the wind and make it its own
But tears the sky with its claws and fangs
Wisdom beyond the bone
-Ibrahim Ridley
Anger
Boils inside
Hotter than soup
Hotter than lava
As it grows
Grows inside
Until it burns your veins
And makes your fist jump
-Ibrahim Ridley
Ode to the maggot by Yousef Komunyakaa
Brother of the blowfly And godhead,
you work magic Over battlefields,
In slabs of bad pork
And flophouses. Yes, you Go to the root of all things.
You are sound & mathematical.
Jesus, Christ, you're merciless
With the truth. Ontological & lustrous,
You cast spells on beggars & kings
Behind the stone door of Caesar's tomb
Or split trench in a field of ragweed.
No decree or creed can outlaw you
As you take every living thing apart. Little Master of earth, no one gets to heaven
Without going through you first.
(analysis)-This poem has in its own way is a timeline. The history can be seen it goes from what he has seen in his home and what he has seen in the battle. The poem also has a “dark praise” like a sign of death maggots something that we all see as disgusting he praises only on the fact that it ends up eating the dead. No matter how powerful, it sounds like he looks at maggots as a force of nature rather than a bug that eats the dead. Face-It by Yousef Kamunyakaa
My black face fades, hiding inside the black granite. I said I wouldn't, dammit: No tears. I'm stone. I'm flesh. My clouded reflection eyes me like a bird of prey, the profile of night slanted against morning. I turn this way--the stone lets me go. I turn that way--I'm inside the Vietnam Veterans Memorial again, depending on the light to make a difference. I go down the 58,022 names, half-expecting to find my own in letters like smoke. I touch the name Andrew Johnson; I see the booby trap's white flash. Names shimmer on a woman's blouse but when she walks away the names stay on the wall. Brushstrokes flash, a red bird's wings cutting across my stare. The sky. A plane in the sky. A white vet's image floats closer to me, then his pale eyes look through mine. I'm a window. He's lost his right arm inside the stone. In the black mirror a woman's trying to erase names: No, she's brushing a boy's hair.
Lime by Yousef Komunyakaa The victorious army marches into the city, & not far behind tarries a throng of women Who slept with the enemy on the edge Of battlemnets. The stunned morning
Opens into a dust cloud of hooves & drums. Some new priests cradle Stone tablets, & others are poised With raised mallets in a forest of defeated Statuaray. Of course, behind them Linger the turncoats & pious Merchants of lime. What's Greek Is forged into Roman; what's Roman Is hammered into a ceremony of birds Headed east. Whatever is marble Burns in the lime kilns because Someone dreams of a domed bathhouse.
My poetry by Ibrahim Ridley. My poetry is usually free-write but I occasionally rhyme on certain poems. I cannot describe my poetry but to me it’s just a feeling written out on paper so if it doesn’t flow with my pen, paper, hand, arm, and mind. When I start writing I cannot stop writing unless I’m completely satisfied with my current emotion or attitude. I’m not good with restricted poetry such as sonnets, almost anything with rhyme schemes. However, I have a certain talent for haikus. The moods of almost all of my current poems are dark themes such as lost love, describing certain feelings of emptiness etc. I have also written happier poems that describes the feeling of flying or something as plain as the joy of a person when the look into the sky.
Apocalypse
Flames go up high reaching the stars ahead
Light together with radio waves, dead
Light life organism alive and well
Dark hands grope across to hell
Huge globes of fire swallowing all sight
Cleansing burning purifying shoots all to fright
Futile running people scrambling about
as I stand above laughing
In oblivion wings stretch karma proving
As I disappear I think how many sin
I see bright lights burning my within
Hands push and pull causing me wonder
I feel salvation as I see all who blunder
-Ibrahim Ridley
Ode To The Griffin
Fangs of Dragons
Claws of lions
Eyes of Eagle
Flying through the air with wings of the hugest span
Eyes that slice the soul
Spilling fear into it fellow man
A beast that can take the wind and make it its own
But tears the sky with its claws and fangs
Wisdom beyond the bone
-Ibrahim Ridley
Anger
Boils inside
Hotter than soup
Hotter than lava
As it grows
Grows inside
Until it burns your veins
And makes your fist jump
-Ibrahim Ridley
Ode to the maggot by Yousef Komunyakaa
Brother of the blowfly And godhead,
you work magic Over battlefields,
In slabs of bad pork
And flophouses. Yes, you Go to the root of all things.
You are sound & mathematical.
Jesus, Christ, you're merciless
With the truth. Ontological & lustrous,
You cast spells on beggars & kings
Behind the stone door of Caesar's tomb
Or split trench in a field of ragweed.
No decree or creed can outlaw you
As you take every living thing apart. Little Master of earth, no one gets to heaven
Without going through you first.
(analysis)-This poem has in its own way is a timeline. The history can be seen it goes from what he has seen in his home and what he has seen in the battle. The poem also has a “dark praise” like a sign of death maggots something that we all see as disgusting he praises only on the fact that it ends up eating the dead. No matter how powerful, it sounds like he looks at maggots as a force of nature rather than a bug that eats the dead.
Face-It by Yousef Kamunyakaa
My black face fades, hiding inside the black granite.
I said I wouldn't, dammit:
No tears. I'm stone. I'm flesh.
My clouded reflection eyes me like a bird of prey, the profile of night slanted against morning.
I turn this way--the stone lets me go. I turn that way--I'm inside the Vietnam Veterans Memorial again, depending on the light to make a difference.
I go down the 58,022 names, half-expecting to find my own in letters like smoke. I touch the name
Andrew Johnson; I see the booby trap's white flash.
Names shimmer on a woman's blouse but when she walks away the names stay on the wall.
Brushstrokes flash, a red bird's wings cutting across my stare.
The sky.
A plane in the sky.
A white vet's image floats closer to me, then his pale eyes look through mine.
I'm a window. He's lost his right arm inside the stone. In the black mirror a woman's trying to erase names:
No, she's brushing a boy's hair.
Lime by Yousef Komunyakaa
The victorious army marches into the city,
& not far behind tarries a throng of women
Who slept with the enemy on the
edge Of battlemnets. The stunned morning
Opens into a dust cloud of hooves
& drums. Some new priests cradle
Stone tablets, & others are poised
With raised mallets in a forest of defeated
Statuaray. Of course, behind them
Linger the turncoats & pious Merchants of lime.
What's Greek Is forged into Roman; what's
Roman Is hammered into a ceremony of birds
Headed east. Whatever is marble
Burns in the lime kilns because
Someone dreams of a domed bathhouse.
My poetry by Ibrahim Ridley.
My poetry is usually free-write but I occasionally rhyme on certain poems. I cannot describe my poetry but to me it’s just a feeling written out on paper so if it doesn’t flow with my pen, paper, hand, arm, and mind. When I start writing I cannot stop writing unless I’m completely satisfied with my current emotion or attitude. I’m not good with restricted poetry such as sonnets, almost anything with rhyme schemes. However, I have a certain talent for haikus. The moods of almost all of my current poems are dark themes such as lost love, describing certain feelings of emptiness etc. I have also written happier poems that describes the feeling of flying or something as plain as the joy of a person when the look into the sky.